Hoye says sex offender ban not dead yet

Monday

Jul 30, 2007 at 12:01 AMJul 30, 2007 at 5:12 PM

TAUNTON — It’s been almost two years since City Councilor Thomas C. Hoye Jr. introduced his controversial ordinance barring convicted sex offenders from living in certain parts of the city, but in those 21 months the proposed law has remained dormant.

Scott Spitler, Staff Writer

It’s been almost two years since City Councilor Thomas C. Hoye Jr. introduced his controversial ordinance barring convicted sex offenders from living in certain parts of the city, but in those 21 months the proposed law has remained dormant.

Hoye, who still strongly supports the ban, said it has not died but is languishing in the City Solicitors office awaiting further study. It likely won’t see the light of day until the end of this year, he added.

“We talk about it periodically,” Hoye said of discussions with the solicitor. “I don’t know what he’s come up with lately — it hasn’t been forgotten, we’re just trying to get it right.”

Repeated calls to City Solicitor Steven A. Torres for comment were not returned.

The proposal would bar convicted level 3 sex offenders — those deemed by the state most likely to re-offend — from living within 2,500 feet of a school, daycare center, park or playground.
That distance may drop to 1,500 or 1,000 feet based on Torres’ recommendation.

In addition, level 2 and 3 offenders would be restricted from being within 300 feet of any area primarily designed for children. Under the ordinance landlords could be fined for renting to level 3’s in banned areas.

Supporters of the proposal say the residency restrictions will make the community safer for children by keeping sexual predators at arm’s length.

Opponents of such laws, including the Massachusetts chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, say the restrictions are illegal because they punish people who have already served prison sentences by, in many cases, pushing them out of the community and into neighboring cities and towns.

Level 1 sex offenders are deemed by the Massachusetts Sex Offender Registry Board as those of low risk, while level 2 is moderate risk and level 3 is a high risk to re-offend.

Photos and addresses of all level 3 offenders are posted, by law, in public places such as the police station and City Hall and are available on-line.

There are 33 level 3 offenders in Taunton and 93 categorized as level 2, according to the state board’s website.

It is rare for a level 3 offender to re-offend in Taunton, Police Captain Robert Smith has said, though it has happened.

Smith is the only officer assigned to register offenders in a city of 56,000. He has admitted in the past that it is difficult to follow everyone.

By effectively banishing sex offenders from the city the sex offender residency restriction is more a punishment than a regulation, John Reinstein, legal director of the Massachusetts chapter of the ACLU, has said, and therefore is violates both the state and the U.S. constitutions.

Taunton, when Hoye first proposed the ordinance, was the first municipality in the state to consider such a law, but now, two other communities — Marlboro and Fitchburg — have restrictions on the books.

Marlboro’s ordinance went into effect in June after the City Council passed it and the mayor left it sitting on her desk, which, after ten days, triggered it into becoming law.

The Marlboro residency restriction borrowed heavily from the Taunton text, though the limit was trimmed from 2,500 feet down to 1,000 feet after the mayor vetoed it in November.

It’s likely that Taunton is intentionally dragging its feet as it waits for someone to sue another town with a sex offender residency law. Then, after the suit winds it way through the court system, Taunton will know the legal parameters.